Let's begin by acknowledging that the concept of a hybrid car breaks no new ground. But electric cars powered by batteries or fuel cells seem unlikely to perform well enough to please both consumers and regulators in the foreseeable future. Given this reality--and the pressure now being exerted on...

Bathed in a shower of accolades from customers, consumer advocates, dealers, and virtually every car magazine, Ford engineers thought their sport utes and light trucks had cleaned up the most-sought-after automotive-industry laurels. Then came the letter about the Missouri hogs. Great vehicle, that...

C hicago-- Maybe we make too much of anniversaries, but as we planned for the 10 th annual Design News Engineering Awards banquet here on March 11, I couldn't help thinking about the many changes that have occurred in the world of design engineering since we started this program a decade ago. From...

TRW Vehicle Safety Systems Seat Belt and Inflatable Restraint Divisions are adapting to a virtual design-through-manufacturing process. One of the first tests of this "master model" approach for TRW was when its Seat Belt group designed a D-ring, the ring that comes out of either the B-pillar or...